The rabbinic conversion of Judaism : : the unique perspective of the Bavli on conversion and the construction of Jewish identity / / by Moshe Lavee.

• Author: Lavie-Levkovitch, Moshe.
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden ;, Boston : : Brill,, [2017]
• Year of Publication: 2017
• Language: English
• Series: Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 99.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (xiii, 321 pages).

In this volume, Moshe Lavee offers an account of crucial internal developments in the rabbinic corpus, and shows how the Babylonian Talmud dramatically challenged and extended the rabbinic model of conversion to Judaism. The history of conversion to Judaism has long fascinated Jews along a broad ideological continuum. This book demonstrates the rabbis in Babylonia further reworked former traditions about conversion in ever more stringent direction, shifting the focus of identity demarcation towards genealogy and bodily perspectives. By applying a reading-strategy that emphasizes late Babylonian literary developments, Lavee sheds critical light on a broader discourse regarding the nature and boundaries of Jewish identity.

Table of Contents

Front Matter -- Copyright page -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: Methods and Models -- “Like an Israelite in Every Respect”: The Conversion Procedure -- The Babylonian “Mini-Tractate” of Conversion -- The Invention of the Conversion Court -- Immersion and Circumcision -- Sinai as Conversion: Acceptance of the Commandments -- “Like a Scab”: Negative Attitudes toward Converts and Conversion -- “Like a Scab”: A Babylonian Expression -- Converting Missionary Images -- Hillel and Shammai Revisited -- “Like a Newborn”: The Erasure of the Convert’s Past -- Newborn: Conversion and the Severing of Kinship -- Newborn: From Forgiveness of Sins to a New Personality -- Contextualizing the Talmud “Against its Will” -- Dominantization: The Rabbinic Conversion of Judaism -- Legalization, Rabbinization and the Shift of Authority -- Genealogical Anxiety and the Body: The Iranian Context -- Conclusion—A Newborn, an Israelite, a Scab: The Babylonian Convert.